Not As It Appears
by iwant2baweasley
Summary: When Scorpius shows up unexpectedly at the Ministry of Magic Christmas Party with not one but three witches Rose doesn't recognize, she doesn't like it at all. Especially since the prat declared his love for her six months earlier.


_Happy 2012! I'm finally getting around to posting some stories that I wrote for livejournal challenges/fests/exchanges._

_This story was written for the **2011 Harry Potter Next Gen Christmas Fest** hosted by nextgen_mas on livejournal. Reveals just happened earlier this week and I had a few extra minutes and figured I be on top of things for once._

_I was so taken with the prompt for this story that I'm going to go ahead and share it with you guys. The Rose/Scorpius prompt was submitted by livejournal user enchantedteapot and was "It's the Ministry Christmas party and for some reason, Scorpius is hitting on everyone but Rose. Rose does not like this. At all."_

_Now that I've [hopefully] wetted your appetite, please read the story and let me know what you think!_

_Enjoy!_

_xoxoBeccaxoxo_

**Title:** Not As It Appears  
><strong>Rating:<strong> PG-13  
><strong>Pairing:<strong> Scorpius/Rose  
><strong>Genre<strong>: Romance  
><strong>When: <strong>Next Generation  
><strong>Word Count: <strong>4,500  
><strong>Warnings: <strong>n/a  
><strong>SummaryNotes: **When Scorpius shows up unexpectedly at the Ministry of Magic Christmas Party with not one but three witches Rose doesn't recognize, she doesn't like it at all. Especially since the prat declared his love for her six months earlier. Is everything as it appears or is something else going on?

**Not As It Appears**

The atrium at the Ministry of Magic had been transformed into a winter wonderland for the annual Christmas party. Most of the attendees were ministry employees and their families, but there were also non-ministry witches and wizards who had gotten invitations to the party.

Dressed in a long, blue satin dress, Rose Weasley stood on the outskirts of the party with her cousin Lily Potter, surveying the people in attendance. She mentally noted the witches and wizards she wanted to speak to and those she was going to try to avoid like the plague. Then her eyes found the one wizard who made her forget all her mental notes.

Scorpius Malfoy.

He stood on the other side of the party, holding a champagne glass and appeared to be talking to somebody. It wasn't until the large witch blocking her view moved that Rose saw that he was talking to a young, thin, blonde witch.

She could not pretend that seeing him with a witch she didn't know made her a bit jealous, but that was the least of her worries; at least for now. What worried her the most was why he hadn't told her he was coming home for Christmas.

_6 Months Earlier_

Rose and Scorpius left the Leaky Cauldron via the floo network and arrived in her flat minutes later.

"Do you want something to drink before you go home?" She asked, hanging her purse on a hook.

"No thanks," he replied, sitting down on her sofa.

She frowned at his answer; he had been acting strange all night.

Every Saturday night since they had left Hogwarts, four years earlier, the two of them and their friends (most of them her cousins) had gotten together at pubs, restaurants and occasionally people's homes. After which, Scorpius would insist on seeing her home and they'd have a cup of tea before he went home for the night.

But tonight was different. And every Saturday for the next year (maybe longer) would be different too.

Tonight's weekly get to together had been a goodbye party for Scorpius as he was leaving for Egypt in the morning. He had been working for Gringotts Wizarding Bank since he'd left Hogwarts and had been promoted and promptly assigned a yearlong job as a liaison for the curse breakers stationed in Egypt.

"What's wrong?" She sat down next to him on the sofa. "You've been off all day."

"I'm having second thoughts about Egypt," he confessed. "I'm not sure I want to go."

"But you were so excited about it a couple weeks ago," she frowned. "What changed?"

"I realized something that is making me question my plans for the future," he replied. "And I'm not sure that spending a year in Egypt is right for me."

"I don't understand. What would make you question your future?"

"You."

"Me?" She squeaked as her blue eyes met his piercing silver ones.

"Yes. You."

"I- I don't understand," she stuttered.

He chuckled and shook his head. "I'm in love with you, Rosie."

"You're what?" Her eyes grew wide. "No! No, you can't be!"

"I didn't believe it at first either," he admitted. "It hit me the other night when I was packing. I found a photo of us at Teddy and Victoire's wedding and it just hit me. You're such a big part of my life that -"

"No. Stop. Shut up," she said, quickly. "You can't love me! You're leaving and this is just -"

"I think I knew I was in love with you before I found out about this job," he told her. "I just didn't realize it until the other day."

"Just stop talking," she told him. "You don't know what you're saying."

"I know exactly what I'm saying," he replied. "I'm serious, Rosie. So serious that if you asked me to stay, I would."

"I would never do that! You love your job."

"Exactly," he stated. "The fact that I would choose you over my job tells me that I really am in love with you."

"Stop saying that!" She exclaimed, jumping up quickly.

"No, Rosie, I'm not going to stop telling you how I feel," he replied, standing up. "And I think you love me, too."

"I don't," she shook head. "You're like a b-"

He cut her off with a kiss and, despite her initial shock, she melted into his embrace. There were sparks, lots of them, and the little moan that left her mouth told him she felt them too.

She ended the kiss almost immediately and backed away, out of his reach. She stared at him as her head spun, trying to catch up with what was happening.

"Tell me you love me," he said. "Tell me not to go."

"You have to go," she told him.

"Then just tell me you love me," he pleaded.

She sucked in a breath and said, "I need time."

"Do you recognize the witch with Scorpius?" Rose asked her cousin.

"Scorpius is here?"

Rose pointed towards Scorpius and the blonde woman.

"I don't know who she is," Lily replied. "I've never seen her before, but I think I've seen her dress before. I think Victoire has one like it or maybe Aunt Fleur does. I'm almost certain it's by that French designer they both love."

"Is that the same French designer who makes your sexy knickers?" A deep voice behind them asked.

"Lorcan!" Lily exclaimed, turning red as she turned to face her boyfriend and his twin brother, Lysander Scamander.

"Well is it?" He grinned at her. "And are you wearing them now."

"Please don't answer that," Lysander and Rose muttered at the same time.

"Alright fine," Lorcan replied. "I guess I'll just get to be surprised tonight."

Lily's face turned redder still as Lorcan took her hand and led her out onto the dance floor.

"Would you like to dance, Rose?" Lysander asked.

"Uh, sure," she nodded.

She stole one last glance at Scorpius and his "friend" then followed Lysander to the dance floor.

_One Day Earlier_

"I need your help," Scorpius said to his cousin as they chatted in a private corner of the Leaky Cauldron.

"This wouldn't have anything to do with a certain cousin of mine, would it?" Teddy Lupin grinned knowingly.

"Right now you're _my_ cousin and your wife is _her_ cousin," Scorpius stated.

"Alright," Teddy laughed. "What do you need help with, _my_ dear cousin?"

Scorpius shot him a glare before he leaned in to speak. "I've been waiting six long months for Rose to come to her senses and now I'm done with waiting."

Teddy swore slightly under his breath then asked, "What did you do, Scorpius?"

"I gave Gringotts my two week notice at the beginning of December," he stated. "As of yesterday, I am unemployed."

"And all because of Rose?"

Scorpius nodded.

"She is going to go nuts when you tell her."

"Exactly. That's why I have to get her to realize she's in love with me before I tell her."

"And how exactly do you plan on doing that?"

"I'll tell you as soon as you agree to help me."

Teddy's gut told him to say no, but the pathetic look on his cousin's face made the decision for him.

"Alright, what do you need me to do?"

Dancing wasn't a particular activity that she found enjoyable, but Rose had let Lysander lead her around the dance floor for a few songs before a slow, romantic song started to play.

"Would you like anything to drink?" Lysander asked as they headed back to their table.

"Yes please," she replied.

"Butterbeer?"

She nodded and sat down at their table. She slipped her shoes off then rested her legs on one of the chairs at the table.

While she waited for Lysander to return, she searched the crowd for Scorpius and found him sitting at a table near her talking to a young, attractive, dark skinned witch with dark curls. She willed him to look in her direction, but he was too focused on the attractive witch in front of him.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Lysander heading back with their drinks, but instead of coming straight to their table, he stopped to talk to Scorpius. It wasn't until Lysander gestured in her direction that Scorpius looked over and caught her staring at him.

He gave her a flirty wink that caused her stomach to fill with butterflies, but also pissed her off. Who did he think he was, winking at her like that while he was flirting with another witch? Especially since he hadn't even bothered to tell her he was coming home, not to mention that he hadn't even attempted to speak to her at all this evening.

With the toss of her red hair, she turned her back towards him and stared out at the dance floor where her parents were dancing embarrassingly close.

His plan was going smoother than he ever imagined, save for the little hiccup that was Rose dancing with Lysander. An uneasy feeling had filled his gut at the sight and it wasn't until Lysander himself had assured him that Rose was very much single that the uneasiness disappeared.

Lysander had also invited him and his female companion to join him and Rose at their table.

Scorpius shot his companion a look, telling her to 'get lost' then stood and followed Lysander over to the table Rose was sitting at alone.

"Evening, Rosie," he said, taking the seat next to her.

"Scorpius," she said, curtly. "Excuse me, Lysander, I see someone I need to talk to."

She stood and walked away, butterbeer in hand.

"Still in love with her?" Lysander smirked over his own butterbeer.

He and his brother were the only two people, save for himself and Rose, that knew that he was in love with her. He had chosen the pair of them because, unlike the Weasley-Potter family, they could keep secrets. If he had even hinted to Albus that he was in love with Rose, the whole family would have known before she did.

Instead of answering aloud, Scorpius merely nodded.

"Well then, good luck to you mate," Lysander chuckled.

Her excuse to leave the table wasn't a complete lie.

She had spotted her Aunt Audrey across the atrium and had decided to say hello. She exchanged the normal pleasantries; then Uncle Percy walked over and said hello to her before apologizing and whisking Aunt Audrey off to meet a foreign minister.

Unintentionally, Uncle Percy had given Rose the opportunity she had been waiting all night to have: a moment to herself. She casually slipped behind a tapestry and through a secret door behind it. She took a deep breath and leaned against a wall in the small room.

Scorpius' unexpected presence had unnerved her. This wasn't how she imagined their first meeting following his return from Egypt. Nowhere in her imagined reunions did he ignore her for not one, but _two_ unknown witches.

After his declaration of love, she had been stubborn and refused to believe that there was anything other than friendship between them, but it had hit her hard that first Saturday night without him. She caught herself turning to share a private joke with him only to remember he was gone, several times that night.

Once she had admitted to herself that she was in fact in love with him, she had made the hard decision to keep her feelings to herself until he returned. She reasoned that he would only be gone a year and therefore, she could wait until he came home to tell him how she felt. She didn't think declaring her love for him in writing would be the same as looking into his silver eyes and telling him that she loved him.

Now she was regretting that decision. Was it possible that her silence had sent him into the arms of another woman?

She had disappeared while he was distracted by the arrival of Lysander's girlfriend and Lily and Lorcan arriving at the table. She had been talking to her aunt and uncle when his attention was pulled away; then, when he looked back in that direction, she was gone.

He listened politely as Lysander's girlfriend told him about herself, but excused himself from the table before she had a chance to ask him what he did for a living.

He quickly made his way across the room and got himself another drink, before starting his search for her. His search for her proved fruitless, but he did run into a familiar brunette witch.

As she drew closer, he noticed something smeared across her face.

"What have you been eating?" He hissed, yanking her to the edge of the atrium.

"Everything," she replied with a glare. "You know I have to eat, Scorpius. It takes a lot of energy to morph and I've done it three times tonight."

"Well use a mirror next time," he muttered, pulling a handkerchief from his pocket. He offered it to her.

"You do it," she replied.

"Fine," he said. He brought the cloth to her face and was getting ready to wipe her face when Rose appeared from behind a nearby tapestry.

She spotted them immediately then gave him a pointed look before turning and storming away.

Enough was enough!

If this was how Scorpius wanted to spend his evening, then game on.

Rose stormed over to the table where Lily and the others were sitting and grabbed her purse.

"Rose?" Lily asked, cautiously.

"If Scorpius ever pulls his head out of his arse and asks where I went, tell him I went home," she said before walking away.

Instead of heading for one of the fireplaces, however, she took a lift to the next floor and went into the women's lavatory.

She stepped in front of a mirror and studied herself for several minutes before she pulled out her wand. She pointed the tip towards her eyes and muttered as spell that changed her eyes from blue to purple. Then she used charms to alter her lips, nose and eyes. She was getting ready to change her hair color when the lavatory door opened and the brunette witch she had seen Scorpius with came in.

The other witch froze in surprise and stared at her.

"Don't mind me," Rose said, feigning amusement. "Just teaching my boyfriend a little lesson."

The witch gulped visibly.

"A word to the wise though," Rose said, thinking on her feet. "I would avoid Scorpius Malfoy, if I were you. He lives in Egypt." She racked her brain to come up with something else then it hit her. "If you're really interested in meeting a guy tonight, you should check out Auror Potter's sons. The oldest, Teddy, is married, but the younger two, James and Albus, are both single and dare I say, ready to mingle."

She wasn't sure if it was just her imagination, but the other witch seemed to blush brightly before turning on her heel and leaving the lavatory.

"Good riddance," Rose muttered as she turned back to her reflection. After changing her hair color, her eyes traveled down to her breasts and she pointed the wand to make them a little bigger. Then she focused in on her dress. She muttered a couple different spells then smiled happily at her the successful transformation of her blue dress into a short black one.

Game on.

Scorpius knew something was up when he spotted Teddy rushing towards him.

"Rose is pissed," Teddy hissed. "You're on your own."

Then his cousin left without a backwards glance, leaving Scorpius to wonder what he meant with that cryptic message.

"You look like a wizard who knows how to have a good time," a feminine voice said from behind him.

Scorpius turned and found himself looking into the purple eyes of a blonde witch he didn't recognize. Despite that, there was something about her that was familiar to him.

"Have we met before?" He asked.

"Maybe in your dreams," she replied, winking at him. She brushed her hair away from her face in a manner that reminded him of Rose. He narrowed his eyes slightly and felt his heart start to pound heavily as his eyes found her chewing her lower lip just like Rose.

She cocked her head to the side and he saw it.

The small heart shaped freckle below her right ear that he was sure Rose didn't even know she had.

"You want to get out of here?" He asked her.

His question caught her off guard. They had only been talking for a minute or so and he wanted to leave the party with her.

"I don't think that is a good idea," she replied. "I don't know you and you don't know me."

"Well, I assure you, that if you really are the witch from my dreams then we know each other _really_ well," he smirked.

She was sure her face was as red as the Christmas decoration around them. She faked a cough then said, "Where would we go?"

"I know a great twenty-four hour café in muggle London," he said. "It's near the Leaky Cauldron."

"Alright," she replied. "I'm here alone, but I'm sure you have people to say goodbye to."

"The one person I would say goodbye to already left," he said, frowning. "And didn't say goodbye."

So he had noticed her absence; good.

"Well, just forget about her and let's go," she said, keeping a straight face.

They used the floo network to travel to the Leaky Cauldron. Then they walked down the road to the café. By the time they reached their destination, he had decided that he was going to have to tell Rose everything while she was pretending to be someone else if he wanted to fix the mess he had created.

"I can't forget about her," he said as they sat down at a table in the back of the cafe.

"Surely she can't be that important," she replied.

"Oh, but she is," he said. "She is an amazing woman and I love her."

"So, which one of the three women you were with this evening was she?"

A waitress arrived to take their orders, giving him time to decide on how much of the truth he was going to tell her. She, obviously, knew that none of the other women had been her, but how much did he want to tell her?

"None of them," he admitted. "At least not the ones that I spent a considerable amount of time with, anyway. She and I were at the same table for a minute or so before she walked away."

"Then who were the other women?"

"I'm not proud of this, but I was trying to make her jealous all evening," he said, feeling too chicken to look up at her. "And those other 'women' weren't really women at all. My cousin is a metamorphmagus and he owed me."

She was going to kill Teddy the next time she saw him. Or better yet, maybe she'd tell Victoire and let her part-Veela cousin deal with him.

"It didn't even work," he continued. "At least not the way I had planned it in my head."

"And what, may I ask, did you want to happen?"

"Well, she's a sexy red head with a temper to match, my Rosie, and I thought she'd storm over and tell the first woman to find some other wizard to flirt with because I was taken, but she didn't."

She clenched her fist under the table and bit her tongue to keep from calling him every name she could think of.

"She wouldn't even look at me," he sighed. "I sat down at the table with her, said hello and she got up without even addressing my presence. Then it went from bad to worse when she caught me wiping something off one of the woman's faces, and then she left the party."

"How thick are you?" She asked, unable to control herself anymore. "Where did you get the idiotic idea that making her jealous would win her love?"

He opened his mouth to say something, but she refused to let him speak.

"You should have gone to her place and taken her to the party as your date," she stated. "Women like that."

"I didn't know if I was welcome at her place," he retorted, trying to control his own anger. "We didn't exactly have the best goodbye when I left for Egypt in June."

"If she loves you -"

"But that's the thing," he cut her off. "I don't know if she loves me. The last thing she said to me was 'I need time' and that was six months ago."

The waitress arrived then with their drinks and he felt smug as he picked up his drink and took a sip. Let her get out of that one.

"Did it ever occur to you that maybe she was waiting to tell you how she felt the next time she saw you in person?" She said. "Telling someone you love them for the first time isn't as special when it's written on parchment."

"She could have visited."

"Maybe she was waiting for an invitation."

An awkward silence followed her last statement.

She wanted to ask him why he hadn't told her he was coming home for Christmas, but since it would give away her true identity, she couldn't.

They finished their drinks; then she said, "I should probably go home and it sounds like you should go clear the air with Rose."

He opened his mouth to say something then shut it and nodded.

"I'm sure if you tell her what you told me and admitted to being the world's biggest prat, she'll forgive you," she said as they made their way to the cashier.

"Hopefully," he nodded. He took out his wallet and paid their bill with muggle money; then they left the café. "Come on, I'll take you home."

"No, that's ok," she said, quickly. "You should go straight to Rose."

He said nothing as they headed towards the Leaky Cauldron, but instead of going into the pub, he pulled her into an alley.

"Let me take you home, Rosie," he said, softly.

"I- I-," she stammered, searching his eyes for the answer. "How did you know?"

"I memorized your freckles a long time ago," he said, deciding to keep the heart shaped freckle to himself. "Please let me take you home, Rosie, so we can talk."

The second she nodded, he grabbed her hand and apparated them to the sitting room of her flat, not caring at all about the cracking sound that echoed through the alley and in her building.

Deciding to give her a few minutes to collect her thoughts, he went into the kitchen and prepared two cups of tea; then he returned to the sitting room, where he found her sitting on the sofa looking like herself again.

"I'm the world's biggest prat," he said, holding out her cup of tea.

She glared up at him as she took the cup.

"You're right, I should have let you know that I was coming home and I should have asked you to go to the party with me tonight," he said. "And I'm sorry for not doing either."

"Why didn't you tell me?" She asked.

It was the moment of truth; he couldn't hide the truth from her anymore.

"Remember the argument I had with my father after I accepted this job?" She nodded. "I didn't tell you everything we fought about that night. He told me that jobs abroad aren't suited for men who aren't single and not married. He said that living abroad was easy for him because my mother and I were with him, but that I wouldn't like it because you weren't with me."

He lowered himself onto the sofa next to her then continued, "He was right, Rosie. The last six months have been the worst six months of my life. I was in Egypt, one of my favorite places in the world, and I hated everything. Even in the rare moments, when I was enjoying myself, I would think about you and how much you would either enjoy it too or dislike it and that would ruin my mood."

He saw her open her mouth to say what he was sure would be a sarcastic apology about ruining his mood, so he quickly placed a finger to her lips to hush her.

"I don't like life without you, Rosie," he said, looking into her eyes as he retracted his finger. "I tried to get my old job with Gringotts back, but they already hired someone else. So I quit my job and after the holidays, I'll start looking for a new one."

She stared at him in shock, trying to process the bomb that he had just dropped on her.

"You quit your job?" She repeated. "But you love your job."

"But I love you more," he stated. "And before you start ranting about me being a git and not thinking things through, I assure you that I have gone through every detail several times and what it comes down to is that you are the most important thing to me."

"But I haven't even told you I love you yet," she said, dumbstruck.

"But you do, don't you?"

She nodded.

"I think a part of me knew all along," he admitted. "And that's why I took the risk to quit my job and move back, even though it meant I might end up alone and stuck in my parents' house until I found my own place."

"What are you going to do now?" She asked him.

"Don't know," he shrugged. "But I'll figure something out. Maybe I can become an Unspeakable like you and learn that wicked spell that made you unrecognizable to everyone except me, because I -"

"-memorized my freckles a long time ago," she finished for him with a smile. "Which is wrong, by the way, because you haven't seen all my freckles."

She giggled at the blush that spread across his skin as he realized what she was saying.

"Oi, you saucy witch," he said. "I only do that with the woman I love."

"You said yourself that you love me," she stated.

"Yes, but it's not true love until you tell me that you love me back," he retorted.

"I love you, Scorpius Malfoy," she said. "Even if you are the world's biggest prat."

She saw something flash in his silver eyes before she felt him yank her cup out of her hand and set it on the coffee table. Then she found herself being pushed back as he positioned his body over hers.

Her eyes met his for a spine tingling second before his lips crashed against hers.

**Author's Note**

_It wasn't until I was reading comments left by fest readers that I realized I had left out the explanation of why Teddy was in Scorpius' debt. Oops.._

_My idea for that was that Scorpius' first appearance at the Burrow happened to just minutes after Teddy and Victoire were caught snogging by her father. His appearance, more than likely with his father as his traveling partner, distracted everyone from Teddy and Victoire._


End file.
